Answering Reformed Objections to Evangelical Support of Israel

I ran across the link to this document on a Reformed Christian website, and besides its being provocative because my political persuasions about Israel are so much the opposite, it also looked like it would make a useful vehicle for exploring some of my objections to the theological position it represents.

An Open Letter to Evangelicals and Other Interested Parties:

The People of God, the Land of Israel, and the Impartiality of the Gospel

Recently a number of leaders in the Protestant community of the United States have urged the endorsement of far-reaching and unilateral political commitments to the people and land of Israel in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, citing Holy Scripture as the basis for those commitments. To strengthen their endorsement, several of these leaders have also insisted that they speak on behalf of the seventy million people who constitute the American evangelical community.

It is good and necessary for evangelical leaders to speak out on the great moral issues of our day in obedience to Christ's call for his disciples to be salt and light in the world. It is quite another thing, however, when leaders call for commitments that are based upon a serious misreading of Holy Scripture. In such instances, it is good and necessary for other evangelical leaders to speak out as well. We do so here in the hope that we may contribute to the cause of the Lord Christ, apart from whom there can never be true and lasting peace in the world.

At the heart of the political commitments in question are two fatally flawed propositions. First, some are teaching that God's alleged favor toward Israel today is based upon ethnic descent rather than upon the grace of Christ alone, as proclaimed in the Gospel.

Has this been stated somewhere in these terms? Perhaps in a document of this sort they can't specifically quote the position they're answering?

I haven't carefully followed this issue but this sounds like an extrapolation and not a fair representation of the position in question Perhaps there are some who see it as described. I suspect there are many different shades of theology involved among Protestants who support Israel with at least some degree of Biblical perspective on it. In a sense I don't support Israel because of my Biblical beliefs at all; I simply think they have a right to be where they are and they are the victims in the whole scenario.

But in terms of the Biblical framework, it is true that present-day Israelis think in terms of their ethnic claims to the reestablishment of Israel, which they see as given to them by God, while I see it as a different historical route to the grace of Christ for the Jews that picks up some unfinished Old Testament threads, not as a denial of the grace of Christ. When the prophecies are understood in the messianic context, this removes all the ethnic assumptions, but I believe they are nevertheless to have a literal earthly fulfillment as well. God's promises to bring them back to the land and cause the land to flower may certainly have a messianic fulfillment in Christ and His Church and the Kingdom of God, but that doesn't mean they won't also have a literal earthly fulfillment as well.

I have to admit, however, that much of my reasoning is based on the fact that Israel is there, that the wilderness has been flowering under their care, that against extreme odds they won some wars that were initiated against them by others, and that their neighbors and the world hate them with a passionate unjust hatred -- all signs that this is God's work.

God began His revelation of Himself on this dusty material planet, and it makes perfect sense that He would bring His final revelation of His glory -- to the entire human family as well as the heavenly creatures -- from the same geographic place He chose to set His name in the first place.

The Reformed or Amillennialist position insists that there are no unfinished Old Testament threads, that all have been fulfilled in Christ and the Church. I'm not sure that ALL the prophecies have been fulfilled. Certainly in Christ there is now no more Jew nor Gentile but we are all one in Christ; certainly the Church IS the true Israel of God -- and yet there does seem to be some unfinished business left for the physical land of Israel. OR, put it this way: Even if all the OT prophecies have been completely fulfilled in Christ, that doesn't prevent there being another level, if you will, to those same prophecies that is yet to have a literal physical temporal fulfillment.

And again, this would be quite in keeping with the fact that the whole Old Testament plays out in this real world after all, even if Israel and the temple and the land are all now fulfilled in Christ and His Church. That is, God may still have dealings with Israel on a temporal earthly level, with the ultimate goal of both judging this world AND bringing the last generation of Jews into His Church.

The angels told the disciples that Jesus is going to come back exactly the same way He left, in real time to a real physical planet, and I don't see a way to spiritualize the passage that describes His literal physical return to the Mount of Olives, which will then split from the impact. Since to the Reformed mindset Israel does not rightly belong where it is, it seems they have to imagine an uninhabitable wilderness with a few scattered farms and nomads, as Mark Twain witnessed Palestine in the 19th century, as the proper place for Christ's return.

Second, others are teaching that the Bible's promises concerning the land are fulfilled in a special political region or "Holy Land," perpetually set apart by God for one ethnic group alone. As a result of these false claims, large segments of the evangelical community, our fellow citizens, and our government are being misled with regard to the Bible's teachings regarding the people of God, the land of Israel, and the impartiality of the Gospel.

There is probably something to this criticism as I've heard this idea expressed by supporters of Israel, even to the denial of the need for Jews to be saved through Christ, but I think it's a minority view. If it's not, if much of how this document characterizes the supporters of Israel IS true, then I have to say I don't agree with THEM either.

However, again on the earthly physical level, the repopulation and revitalization of the land of Israel, PLUS their being surrounded by implacable enemies, certainly looks like fulfilled prophecy, at the very very least certainly HAS to be God's own work. I think these Reformed theologians are falling for a false either/or -- and perhaps there is some reason for this if their opponents are doing the same thing in the opposite direction.

In what follows, we make our convictions public. We do so acknowledging the genuine evangelical faith of many who will not agree with us. Knowing that we may incur their disfavor, we are nevertheless constrained by scripture and by conscience to publish the following propositions for the cause of Christ and truth.

1. The Gospel offers eternal life in heaven to Jews and Gentiles alike as a free gift in Jesus Christ. Eternal life in heaven is not earned or deserved, nor is it based upon ethnic descent or natural birth.

I must say I feel like saying to this, "So what else is new?" because it seems to be erecting a straw man of the evangelical defense of Israel. Again, MAYBE there are some (I've seen some who appear to tilt in that direction) who deny this fundamental gospel truth, but I doubt that's more than a slim minority, while everyone else would say "Of course, we know that."

2. All human beings, Jews and Gentiles alike, are sinners, and, as such, they are under God's judgment of death. Because God's standard is perfect obedience and all are sinners, it is impossible for anyone to gain temporal peace or eternal life by his own efforts. Moreover, apart from Christ, there is no special divine favor upon any member of any ethnic group; nor, apart from Christ, is there any divine promise of an earthly land or a heavenly inheritance to anyone, whether Jew or Gentile. To teach or imply otherwise is nothing less than to compromise the Gospel itself.

Perhaps they are answering a fringe segment, such as John Hagee and others who believe like him? I think they are a small minority among those who strongly support Israel's existence as fulfillment of prophecy.

Again, I don't know if my view of this is shared by many others or not, but I think this is a function of the two levels of prophetic fulfillment I suggest above. They don't contradict each other, they are parallel aspects of God's revelation. God's people ARE Christ's people, He is the way and no-one comes to the Father but by Him, so the Jews have to become Christ's people to be saved, but on the way there God is also dealing with all the peoples of earth.

Besides saving out a people for Himself He also has the objective of declaring His glory and His possession of the land -- the land is the whole earth as well as the spiritual or heavenly Canaan. His Israelites were His chosen instrument for that purpose and after all the promises have been fulfilled in Christ He might yet resume those dealings in the 70th week of Daniel, both to bring His rebellious people to Christ and to judge the world. Sure, I guess He could do this without temporal Israel, but it looks to many like He's chosen to do it with them. He'll probably teach some Christians a lesson in the process too.

Biblical logic is on our side. For instance, the Seventieth Week of Daniel is a major major sign that the Reformed camp seems to want to play down. The first 69 weeks of Daniel's prophecy were fulfilled EXACTLY, so why would we expect the 70th to be fulfilled any less exactly? And since it remains unfinished to this day it must be yet future, and since the first 69 week marked off the last years of the Old Testament up to the revelation of Christ as King, it makes perfect sense that the last week could very well occur within a resumed Old Testament context and be marked by the revelation of the Antichrist, and this does seem to require a restoration of Old Testament trappings, Israel itself, the temple and so on, even if ultimately these things will have to be abandoned as the Reality of Christ and the heavenly Jerusalem is completed. It's beautiful, it's almost symphonic in its arrangement, I do think it takes a spiritual tin ear to hold to the one-dimensional Reformed argument.

3. God, the Creator of all mankind, is merciful and takes no pleasure in punishing sinners. Yet God is also holy and just and must punish sin. Therefore, to satisfy both his justice and his mercy, God has appointed one way of salvation for all, whether Jew or Gentile, in Jesus Christ alone.

No argument here, folks. I'll try to be sparing now about repeating what I've said above.

4. Jesus Christ, who is fully God and fully man, came into the world to save sinners. In his death upon the cross, Jesus was the Lamb of God taking away the sin of the world, of Jew and of Gentile alike. The death of Jesus forever fulfilled and eternally ended the sacrifices of the Jewish temple. All who would worship God, whether Jew or Gentile, must now come to him in spirit and truth through Jesus Christ alone. The worship of God is no longer identified with any specific earthly sanctuary. He receives worship only through Jesus Christ, the eternal and heavenly Temple.

No argument here either. As for the project to rebuild the Temple, I really don't see that Christians regard this as a legitimate alternative to Christianity -- do some? Sad if so, but that hasn't been my impression from the discussions and studies I've been in on about this. As many objectors to this idea point out, its reestablishment would be blasphemy in itself. But it seems to me that's a major theme of the last days, the coming to fruition of the "mystery of inquity."

The blinded Jews want the Temple back, of course, it's part of their heritage as they understand it, and it IS possible to argue from scripture that it must be rebuilt to fulfill certain prophecies of the last days. It's just a type, and in the Christian age it's blasphemy, but may nevertheless very possibly be packed with implications for God's plans for planet earth and indeed the entire cosmos: to glorify Himself in the eyes of the world in the full redemption of the Jews, the root of the tree into which the Gentiles were grafted, and in the judgment of the world. To glorify Himself. The ethnic factor is error, but they aren't Christians -- yet.

5. To as many as receive and rest upon Christ alone through faith alone, to Jews and Gentiles alike, God gives eternal life in his heavenly inheritance.

6. The inheritance promises that God gave to Abraham were made effective through Christ, Abraham's True Seed. These promises were not and cannot be made effective through sinful man's keeping of God's law.

Very true and I don't know any Christian who thinks otherwise.

Continued next post.